


remind me where I came from

by tinybluewitch (madandimpossible)



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, I am not even calling this an AU i want this to happen, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Reincarnation, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-27
Updated: 2021-02-27
Packaged: 2021-03-19 02:07:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29743344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madandimpossible/pseuds/tinybluewitch
Summary: The Luxon’s light expanded and touched the radiance of souls and pulled them in. Consecuted or not - these souls belonged here. Their souls belonged to It.When Caleb and Jester meet their end - they're actually meeting a new beginning.
Relationships: Jester Lavorre/Caleb Widogast
Comments: 14
Kudos: 52





	remind me where I came from

* * *

He swung his sword arm. He flinched at the feeling of steel against the wooden dummy he’s practicing against as the drill sergeant barks out another order. He straightened his sweaty spine. The dark green fabric of his uniform sticking to his tanned skin in the dappled sunlight. The shouts of their superiors rang out over the exerted grunts of his comrades.

He narrowed his blue eyes. And put all the force behind his swing.

Distantly, somewhere, he heard a quiet voice turning to a roar. A flash of necrotic wings behind a woman with tears streaking down her face.

He winced as his nerve endings sparked with pain.

“Enough for today, Becker.” The sergeant called with a rough, loud clap. His Zemnian clear cut and sharp – as polished as the Empire pins that adorned his lapel. “Get some water.”

The boy shook his head. The salt stung his eyes.

The air smelled electric. _Feels like a storm._ He thought as he cast his gaze out, past the muddied trenches and track fields, to the low, grey clouds hanging heavy in the sky.

~

She shot upright in her bed with a scream fading from her throat. The phantom scent of blood surrounded her. The lingering laughter of featureless faces. She pressed the heels of her palms to her eyes. The static of magic clung to her sheets.

 _It’s not real_. She reminded herself. She wiped the tear tracks from her cheeks just in time before her parents came bursting into her pillowed and satin bedroom.

“Orianna!” Her mother swooped into the room with her long robe trailing behind her. Her brown hair was plaited down her back, her face round and kind and full of concern – “My little sunrise, are you alright?”

“Is this another nightmare?” Her father hovered by the bed, the reflective sheen of his slanted, yellow eyes, “Perhaps you will rethink your decision to join the Academy?”

“No.” She answered quickly, her tail flicked nervously by her shoulder, “I’m – I just – I heard a noise and it startled me.” The lie came easily. She was lying to her parents more and more often lately.

The dreams.

The flashes of color and scent.

The feeling of someone’s breath at the shell of her ear.

Her family was already shadowed by suspicion in town. No need to add “crazy tiefling” to the list. Her father’s business would plummet, and her mother would never recover. _No_. She would be a good, dutiful daughter and complete her education, and then she’d serve in The King’s Army and everything would be _well_.

Her father rubbed a hand over his shadowed jaw, “I am sure it was nothing—”

“Nothing!” Her mother shrieked. Her nails dug into her daughter’s shoulders, “Our child cries out in the night and you say it’s _nothing_!”

“Mama, it’s—” She tried to interject. To remind her mother that she was nearly _sixteen –_ she didn’t need her father to look under the bed for monsters.

She knew well enough that the monsters were in her dreams.

“What I was _trying_ to say was that I am sure it was nothing inside Orianna’s room, but I will go and check around the house.” Her father reached out and pet the top of her head. Like he used to do when she was small. She nodded and let her mother fuss over her hair. Her lovely, so-blonde-it-was-nearly-white hair. It nearly reached her waist, now.

Her mother busied her hands with braiding sections of her daughter’s hair while humming.

She closed her eyes.

She pretended she was relaxed and calm by her mother’s ministrations.

While within, her heart thumped painfully against her ribs.

~

He dipped his quill into an inkpot. The sharpened pointed cut across the page as he detailed his latest report to his superior officer. The candlelight cut sharp angles to his face and highlighted the tints of gold in his brown hair. He might’ve been a gargoyle, hunched in the dark, his face impassive as stone.

An echo of memory brushed past him. Old parchment, arcane lights floating beside him, a sense of belonging and revulsion deep within his gut.

The memory grabbed him. It pulled him. The emotions unspooled and unraveled between his fingers.

The heat of the candle flame suddenly burned a hundred times fiercer. It singed his eyelashes. He could taste smoke and ash.

His quill slipped.

He looked down at his pristine report.

The chair scraped backward against the wood.

His mouth unhinged in horror.

The unknown arcane symbols spiraled out from the center of the parchment. A mixture of common and Zemnian flowing together – along with writing he didn’t recognize – the letters elongated and sharp. It reminded him of arrowheads and daggers. His quill carved into the desk.

He pressed his fingertips to the darkened circles beneath his eyes.

His stomach churned.

A single word stood out among the rest: _Jester_.

~

“Be well and write often.” Her mother kissed both her cheeks.

“Take care, my dear.” Her father squeezed her hands. The crimson color shades deeper and darker than her own.

She joined the other wizards around the teleportation circle.

The chalk lines began to glow.

The familiar heat of magic pulled her forward.

On instinct - she closed her eyes.

A different wizard stood before her. His shoulders were tight in concentration as he muttered to himself while looking over his book. A few strands of auburn hair fell against his brow. She smiled at him.

This was one of her favorite visions.

She always felt an overwhelming sense of peace when he appeared.

 _Hi Cay-leb._ He had given her his name in a dream. She liked how it sounded.

She imagined herself leaning over his shoulder. She imagined that she could read the strange writing of his journal. She imagined seeing him duck away and blush.

Her body jolted forward into the teleportation circle.

That’s the sucky thing about fantasies. They don’t last.

She gasped, holding a rose-quartz-colored hand to her chest, “Holy shit.” She beamed at the other wizards – _novices_ – that were in the circle with her. “Is it like that EVERYTIME?!”

“Nearly so.” The mage leading their group said with an aristocratic sniff to the air. She despised him almost instantly.

“This way. Please.”

~

War, he supposed, was _inevitable_. But there was a difference between striking a friend with a practice sword and then doing the _real_ thing.

He didn’t have the stomach for it.

He saw his hands circle an old man’s throat. The thrill of revenge making his blood hot.

The choking, burning smell of charred flesh. The guilt suffocating him. The madness pressing into his skull.

A heartrending scream of agony. A creature shattering into a thousand pieces.

“Alexander!” He looked up, his eyes meeting a fellow soldier’s, “I’ve been calling your name for ages. We are heading out. Are you ready?”

“I’m sorry, I hadn’t heard you.” He pulled his rucksack over his shoulder, “Ja. I’m ready.”

It was a lie.

A lie to keep his country and home safe.

But what could he tell them? If he told his superiors that he was plagued with dreams and nightmares, that he felt he _understood_ magic without ever once opening a tome, that when he looked over his shoulder – he expected to see someone else standing behind him. His superiors would haul him off to the asylum.

“We’re to be meeting with the mages in the southwest post.” The soldier said as he briskly led him through the encampment, “Not bad for an eighteenth birthday present, is it? Showing those crick bastards whose boss, yeah?”

 _I’m seventeen._ He wanted to remind him. _I’m seventeen. I don’t want to die._

He fell into step behind the others. He lifted his fist to his heart as a salute.

“Alexander Becker, reporting for duty, sir.” He said, his eyes on the dirt, a soft, gentle breeze pulled at his dark hair.

“Ah, _Gut_.” His superior glanced at his ledger, “You’ll be in the Jester division. You’ll follow the Queen squadron to the rendezvous point.”

“ _Jester_.” He whispered to himself.

The word stirred something in his chest. It reminded him of his mother, Sabine’s, apple orchard. It reminded him of a brown-skinned woman who collected buttons. The sharp tang of summertime. The bright flash of fireworks. The crisp, cool stream bubbling around his ankles as he and his brothers searched for tadpoles.

He realized with a start that the feeling was _longing_. It made absolutely no logical sense. Yet, he was sure of it. He thought back to the horrific scratches of his quill against his desk. The sense of dread that overcame him that day.

He compared it to the feeling he held now. At the center of his chest. The way it ached across his bones.

_An omen of death shouldn’t feel…like this._

It was only a firm shove to his shoulder by another man’s backpack that he returned to reality.

_Am I losing my mind?_

He caught his reflection in a puddle as they marched.

He could’ve _sworn_ he saw a different man looking back at him. A man with reddish hair and haunted blue eyes. A spotted and striped cat draped over his shoulders.

_I have. I have lost my mind._

~

She pillowed her arms underneath her head. Spending her nights sleeping on the cold, grey rocks wasn’t what she envisioned her life would be like. She dreamed she’d run away and become a pirate. She dreamed of coming home with treasure – so much gold her family would be taken care of forever – and then realizing she was in love with the handsome, first mate that loyally served and fought alongside her.

At least, she _did_ dream that. Until the day when all her dreams became complicated, vivid, painful, and beautiful stories that carried through to her waking moments.

She knew it was becoming a real _problem_ when she just stopped replying to the name ‘Orianna.’ It wasn’t an **active** choice she made. One day, it just stopped registering. It drove some of her instructors to madness and others to deep, parental concern.

Everyone else at the Academy thought it was an elaborate joke. That blossomed into her peers calling her ‘ _Trickster’_. Trickster became Joker which eventually lead to _Jester_. As the politics of the Academy were akin to a political court and every court needed a Jester.

It became the only name she’d respond to. She couldn’t’ say why, exactly. It just felt _right_.

“Jester, are you awake?” The half-elf, Morwen, gently shook her shoulder, “I need your help.”

“Why, me, exactly?” Jester muttered.

“Because…” She fidgeted with the embroidered sleeves of her robe, “He keeps muttering your name.”

Jester peeked one eye open to read her face. Morwen continued to fiddle with her sleeves and pull at the threads. Her green eyes were wide, imploring, and Jester wondered if Morwen acted on her own inspirations or if someone sent her. Would she get punished if Jester said no?

Jester rubbed at the scar on her palm with her thumb.

“Okay, take me to him.”

Morwen bowed once and pulled her white hood up and over her face. Jester shoved her hands into her pockets as she followed Morwen to the Cleric’s tent. The layout of the campsite was designed like a layered circle. At the center were the majority of tents for healers, generals, and archmages. The more it expanded from the center, the fewer tents, and the lower in station each soldier became.

If an ambush occurred, it would be the foot soldiers and infantrymen who died first.

 _Like lambs to a slaughter._ Jester thought with a twist to her lips. Her own ranking as a wizard meant that she was closer to the center. Yet, there was no illusion about where she stood within the politics of camp. The mages could be battle fodder, too.

Her nose wrinkled at the smell of alcohol as the flap lifted. The tent was half-full. Soldiers laid on cots, some sleeping, while others stared upward with vacant expressions. The healers, dressed in white and red robes like Morwen, rotated between the beds.

But even Clerics had limits and their latest skirmish had not gone well.

Morwen grasped Jester’s wrist and led her to a cot at the far end. A man – no older than she was – laid on his side. His uniform soaked through with sweat. His eyes flickered rapidly behind his eyelids. His dry lips parted with heavy, labored breath.

There was something _familiar_ to him.

Jester couldn’t name it.

Perhaps they fought on the same battlefield together.

“I don’t know him.” Jester said as she lowered herself to the stool beside him, “He called for me?”

“And others.” Morwen chewed her lip, “Beauregard, Yasha, Veth…Fjord, and Caduceus.”

Jester turned her face away from Morwen and fisted her hands tight to stop them from trembling.

“Weird.” She shrugged, playing it all off, pretending that those names did not mean something to her.

As if they were not the names of the people who lived inside her dreams.

“What’s his name?” Jester studied his face. His dark hair fell limp across his forehead. A shadow of a beard covered his jaw. Her fingertips itched to brush it away. A strange, unknown stirring inside her – as if instinctively – she knew she was responsible for healing him.

“Alexander Becker.” Morwen replied with another anxious tug of her sleeve, “Will you stay? I have to complete my rounds and—"

Jester brushed her off, “I’ll sit with him.”

Morwen bowed again, “Thank you.”

Jester leaned forward and let her eyes trail over his face. He was handsome, she supposed. In a rugged, sleepy kind of way. His long hair splayed across his pillow in dark curls. His eyelashes kissed his tan and ruddy cheekbones. Her gaze trailed down the strong column of his neck to the pins and markings of his rank on his uniform. The defined slope of his shoulders, down to his biceps and forearms, to the calloused mounds of his hands. A fighter.

“Who are you?” She whispered.

The question hung in the silence between them.

The man whimpered in his sleep.

His fingers twitched.

“Hm. Not much for conversation, I guess.” Unable to help it Jester smiled to herself. This man gave her the same sense of peace as her Caleb.

This stranger reminded her of home.

~

“You should really wake up soon. I’m getting tired of checking on you.” The lilting accent teased him. He felt a blessedly cool touch against his brow, his cheeks, and the back of his neck. “What do you think they’ll serve for dinner tonight?”

He groaned.

“No way – turnip soup?” Her laughter rang through his ears.

He pushed with all his strength against the darkness.

He needed to see her face.

He needed to know it was _her_.

He saw her smiling on the deck of a ship. Her hair billowed out around her face. A green cloak flapping in the wind.

He saw her wiping her tears with the back of her hands.

He saw her with amber reflections in her eyes.

“Jes…Jester.” He choked out as he fumbled through the darkness of time and memory.

“Mhm?” The cold, soaked fabric rubbed his cheek, “One day I’d like to hear you say more than just my name.”

_My name?_

He gasped.

His eyes opened.

And the woman sitting beside him jumped back. The soaked rag clutched to her throat.

He blinked and tried – _desperately_ – to understand. It was as if two images were laid on top of one another.

He saw a young, light pink-colored tiefling with white hair, adorned with beads and baubles hanging from her complicated and layered braids. She wore the amethyst and gold colors of a battle mage.

In the same moment – however - He saw a blue-skinned tiefling with a green cloak, a weasel in her hood, with her lips upturned in a mischievous smile.

Any second now, his heart would burst.

“Alexander?”

“No.” He coughed. His throat dry and rough from disuse.

The woman – Jester? – dropped the rag and hurriedly poured him a glass of water. He took it with a quiet thanks and drank it down in full.

“Your name isn’t Alexander?” She asked, giving a concerned look over her shoulder, to an elven woman standing nearby.

“It is.” He coughed again, holding out his glass, “But, it also…wait…who are you?”

“Oh.” She smiled as she refilled it.

His heart kicked into overdrive again.

“Me? Everyone calls me Jester.” She sat up a little straighter. Her fangs flashing as she smiled.

“Jester….” He said her name very, very quietly. It tasted familiar inside his mouth. As if he’s said it a hundred thousand times. His eyes raised to read her expression and found that she was looking at him with that same sense of awe and bewilderment.

“This is going to sound crazy, I know, but has anyone ever told you that you look like a Caleb?” Her rosy cheeks darkened prettily, “Honestly – you remind me of…someone…with that name.”

 _Caleb_.

“A friend?” He asked, testing the name in his head, and discovering that it slid into place like a missing puzzle piece.

“A friend.” She confirmed with a purposeful nod, “A good friend.”

Something wild and feral gripped his chest. Desperation not to _lose_ her. He mustn’t let her just walk away from this tent, into the masses of hundreds of soldiers and mages, to never be seen again.

“Could we be friends?” He blurted out before he thought more of it.

Jester tucked her white hair behind her ears. Her eyes darted to the ground before rolling and meeting his.

“Well, I should _hope_ so! I’ve only been tending to your beside for the past week!”

It was his turn to blush.

“ _Danke_.”

She shrugged, pouring him another glass of water, “It’s what friends are for, _Ja_?” She teased with a wiggle of her eyebrows.

~

Life became _infinitely_ more interesting the day he became friends with Jester. She liked to joke with him. She liked to say weird, cryptic shit and use her spells to cause chaos. She was impossible to beat at cards – which is how she made most of her money since her allowance for being in the King’s Army was sent to her parents.

She would watch him train and tease him to take off his shirt. He taught her how to break free of a grapple hold. He showed her the various knots and snares he could create from his days as a tracker and hunter for the army.

They sat next to each other around the campfire with their shoulders pressed comfortably together as Jester showed him her grimoire. He tried not to linger on the way the arcane symbols haunted his dreams and waking thoughts.

They were equations he shouldn’t understand. Yet, he _did_.

She would nudge him awake at night and crawl into the bedroll with him. Even if it was more dangerous for her to sleep on the outer ring of the encampment.

And he’d fall asleep with her breath tickling his cheek.

It was during one such night when Jester nudged him awake and said, “We should go to Xhorhas. To Rosohna.”

“We’d die.” He said matter-of-factly as his arms opened and Jester snuggled into his embrace. The Empire wasn’t kind to deserters, either.

“No.” Jester pressed her cheek to his heartbeat, “That’s where we’ll live.”

He pressed his lips to the crown of her head, “You want to _live_ there?”

“Mhm.” Jester sighed, “But, I will only go if you come with me.”

“I told you a long time ago,” He said, tightening his arms around her, “My story begins and ends with you, Jester.”

“Can we go soon?” She tilted her face up and he could feel her lips at his jaw. The warmth of his blush went straight down to his toes.

“Yes.” He agreed, “I assume you’ve got a plan in mind?”

He could feel her smile in the darkness, “Awwww! You know me so well!”

~

Jester crouched, her fingers trailing in the air, magic crackling through her veins – she could _feel_ Caleb beside her whenever she used magic. It was a nice reminder that he was still with her. Even after all this time.

The alarm that followed was instantaneous. She yanked her hood over her head and threaded through the panicked soldiers and mages.

“Ambush! Ambush!” They shouted as Jester’s illusion of Kryn soldiers descending the hillside tricked them. She caught Morwen’s gaze across the way and the elven woman nodded, her hands waving, as she combined Jester’s illusion of sound with her own trickery of harmless tremors in the ground. The panic increased tenfold as the soldiers believed that Kryn were going to attack from below ground.

Jester gave Morwen a thumbs up before disappearing once more.

She wove through the bodies. If all went to plan – she’d meet Alexander on the edge of the third ring.

They’d be able to slip away into the night before the sentry returned to their posts.

They’d be free from it all – the war, the bloodshed, and the terrible nightmares. Her parents would understand. They had to.

Her heart pounded and her boots squelched in the mud. She expected every passing soldier to stop her. To demand to know where she was going. But no one did. The second ring cleared. The edge of the third ring only a few paces away.

They were going to make it.

A man with reddish hair, pulled into a half-up bun, with book holsters strapped to his chest and a long, purple coat stood before her.

“Caleb!” She threw her arms around his shoulders. The scent of parchment and ink enveloped her. She never tried to hug her hallucinations before. It was surprisingly solid and warm…

“Jester?” He winced and Jester drew back with her brows knit in confusion.

“Oh. Alexander.” She tried to keep the disappointment from her voice, “It’s you!”

“Were you expecting someone else?” He upturned the collar of his heavy, woolen brown coat to hide his face.

“No, but I—” Jester swallowed, and shook her head, “Nevermind! Let’s go.”

They didn’t speak again until they reached their first hiding spot. A low, rocky outcropping that Alexander had discovered while scouting. Jester began going through their supplies, re-organizing, and unrolling the rudimentary map of Xhorhas she had pilfered from the general’s tent. She passed the short bow that they stashed over to Alexander and strapped her own dagger to her thigh. She wasn’t a fighter like he was, but she knew which end to stick someone with.

“Perhaps…” He rubbed the back of his neck, “We should use different names as we travel.”

“Okay. Well. Jester isn’t my _real_ name.” She looked up at him, backlit by moonlight and starlight, like a vision from one of her dreams.

“From now on…you might as well call me Caleb. Since you seem to think that name fits me so well.” He said, quietly, “Unless that is too strange?”

Jester beamed up at him, “That’s not strange at all, _Cay-leb_!” Her heart skipped inside her chest.

“It’s not?” He tilted his head, “What if we meet up with your old friend?”

“Then I get to have two Caleb best-friends.” She answered with a shrug, pulling her backpack over her shoulder, “Come on! Let’s go.”

Their plan would be to journey through the night, as far as they could go, their hands clasped together as Jester guided them with her Darkvision. They were on foot. They had limited supplies. They were crossing the border to the enemy’s land. The King’s Army would eventually realize that they had deserted their posts. Whether they’d send scouts after them, Jester wasn’t sure if they were worth the manpower, but they’d need to be careful either way.

Even if assassins didn’t trail them, there were still Kryn soldiers and wild beasts roaming these dead lands.

Yet, Jester _knew_ her answers were in Rosohna. Which meant she wasn’t going to give up until she saw that city with her own eyes. And not the eyes of whoever she was inside her dreams.

~

Caleb sat on watch with Jester’s book in his lap. He swallowed. A nervous, tingling sensation ran down his spine. He glanced over to Jester, this woman who he traveled with, yet felt so _much_ for. Her white hair was loose and wild around her face. A half-finished braid draped over her shoulder.

“This is nonsense.” He grumbled to himself, “I can’t do magic. I’m _not_ a wizard.”

Still, he found himself opening the tome. The symbols and swirls of Arcana spilling out across the fine, crisp parchment. The hints of Jester in the notes. The little drawings. The hasty, scrawled notes appeared to be fragments of her dreams.

He followed the threads – pulled by instinct and something _deeper_ – until he caught words that couldn’t be components of a spell.

Next to the glyph for the spell Shape Water: the name _Fjord_ was written.

He scanned the page, reading slowly, as the glyphs and notes merged together.

A sketch of a feather with the name _Beauregard_ written beneath it.

Beside an incomplete ingredient list – the word _Yasha_. A lightning bolt next to it. In her entry for the spell ‘hideous laughter,’ there was a note: _‘This was_ _a favorite of Nott/Veth’_. The dreams tugged at the edges of Caleb’s consciousness. His fingertips traced the inked patterns and symbols.

On and on, the names continued: Mollymauk. Essek. Caduceus. Kiri. Twiggy. Frumpkin. Marion/Ruby of the Sea. The Traveler. Orly. She tucked them into spells, some hidden yet clearly beloved.

“I _know_ them.” He said to the brisk, night air. He closed his eyes now, and he could see their faces. He could name them. He could recall the sounds of their voices. He could pull forward visions and thoughts of them that felt as real as the stone beneath his feet.

“I knew it.” Jester whispered, startling him to open his eyes and snap the book shut, “You’re like _me_.”

Her eyes sought his, and she leaned forward, planting her hands on her knees, “You know those names. You – you have dreams as I do, don’t you?”

Caleb licked his lips.

“Yes.” He handed her spell book back, “Around my fifteenth birthday…I started…” He swallowed and looked away, “seeing things…”

This would be the moment where she called him insane. It was one thing to admit to crazy dreams, it was entirely another to admit you saw visions of people you never met. That you felt you knew them deep within the very center of your soul. That you – even – _loved_ them.

She reached out and covered his hand with hers, squeezing his fingers, “You’re not alone.”

“What is _this_?” He finally found the courage to face her once more, “Have we been put under some kind of spell? Is there magic that makes you feel as if you’ve lived as someone else?”

“I don’t know.” Jester’s shoulders slumped, her lip jutting out in a soft, kissable pout, “I just know we won’t find our answers in the Empire.”

“Come here.” He tugged her hand to his chest and Jester crawled forward and sat between his legs. Her head tucked beneath his chin. He let his other arm come to encircle her waist, to keep her close and snug against him, as they waited for the dawn.

“I will be with you every step of the way, _Liebling_.” He said, “And every step after that.”

Jester leaned up and pressed a feather-light kiss to his chin.

“Promise?”

He smiled, nuzzling his nose against her forehead, “I promise.”

“Promise, like, _really_ promise?” Jester craned her neck, her horn bumping his jaw as she adjusted her position, “Pinkie promise?”

“I can do even better than that.” He leaned down and pressed his mouth to hers. Her fingers twisted and dug into the front of his coat. Her head tilted back, and her mouth opened beneath his and Caleb _forgot_ about terrifying dreams and dizzying reality. He forgot the fear of assassinations and the hangman’s noose.

His calloused hand cupped her warm cheek and deepened the kiss. Jester sighed a breathy little moan into his mouth.

And he felt magic brewing inside his veins.

~

It was instinct, not _magic_ , that alerted Caleb. He drew his shield, just in time, to deflect two arrows from the darkness.

The resounding ‘thud’ against the wood awakened Jester and she was on her feet before he was – both hands spread out as four globes of light burst into creation.

He unsheathed his sword, standing at Jester’s side, as his eyes scanned the mountainside. The adrenaline of an unknown threat flooded his sense. His mind kicked into a strategy. They were likely outnumbered, but that didn’t mean they would _lose_. The best course of action was to disarm and flee unless it was the Empire that tracked them.

A heartbeat passed before the Kryn soldiers descended upon them. Caleb threw himself into the battle. He let himself become the shield and sword standing in front of Jester.

He meant to keep his promise from that evening. He would remain by her side. Until the very end.

An acidic, green-colored arrow whizzed past his head and struck the archer hiding within the treetop. Caleb didn’t have time to watch as the body fell from the tree, limp and lifeless. He kept his focus on the soldiers in front of him and trusted Jester to hold her own. That she’d support him where she could while defending herself the rest of the way.

His sword gleamed in the glowing, red lights that Jester conjured. The stone slickened with blood.

And he heard Jester wince--

“Jester, are you alright?” He asked, blocking an incoming blow, and then shoving his shield at his attacker and knocking them prone.

“I’m having the time of my life.” She cheekily replied, “Hey, Caleb, quick question – do you trust me?”

Caleb grunted as the blade cut through his shoulder, the pain radiating down his arm and weakening his grip on his shield, “You’re asking me that _now_?”

“I’ll take that as a yes.” Jester slapped her hands together and inky, shadowed blackness spilled from her palms and overtook their modest campsite. Her magical lights winked out of existence. The Kryn soldiers let out confused cries and Caleb felt her hand grabbing his shoulder.

She pulled him backward, out of the radius of her spell, and together – they ran. His heart hammered in his chest. _If we reach the trees, we’ll be able to hide._

“Hurry, Caleb, this way!” Jester looked back at him. Her eyes widened.

“Caleb!” Jester screamed as a sharp, agonizing pressure clamped around his wounded shoulder. His body jerked backward, his sword falling from his bloodied grip, as the creature yanked him and then tossed his body to the side.

Caleb wheezed – the air forcibly stolen from his lungs. His hip and ribs smarted with pain, and his head throbbed, but all he could _think_ of was Jester. The muscular panther-like creature stalked toward her, his tongue lolled out of his mouth, Caleb’s blood dripping from its fangs.

He blinked slowly as darkness filled the edges of his vision.

Jester glared with tears trailing down her cheeks at the soldier that rode the fearsome creature.

He planted his hands down, rolling onto his stomach, and pushed himself to be on all fours. His stomach clenched, threatening to expel the small number of rations they ate earlier in the evening. Caleb pushed himself to woozy, unsteady feet.

He could hear Jester muttering an incantation, but it felt as if someone had filled his head full of cotton.

The world muddled and deafened.

He grabbed his sword with slick, bloody fingers. His other arm hung limp at his side. Useless. He exhaled sharply through his nose.

He fought worse odds before.

“Hey!” He shouted, forcing the creature and its rider to turn, “You have a shitty cat.”

The moorbounder spun, galloping toward him in long, powerful strides.

“Jester, go!” He shouted, sliding into a sideways stance with his sword trembling, “I’ll find you. Just **_go_**!”

The moorbounder leaped – his wide, slobbering, and sharp maw opening to devour him.

~

The wildlands of the Kryn Dynasty disappeared.

Caleb facing down the Moorbounder disappeared.

Jester found herself standing in a library, looking over her Caleb’s shoulder, as he explained the _Dunamancy_ spell he was working on. She reached over, touching the symbol, and then met his blue eyes with a smile.

Jester gasped, jolting back to reality, as the knowledge flooded her mind. Her memories returned. Her _life_.

Her life as _Orianna_ , the merchant’s daughter, the wizard, the girl with dreams inside her head. She felt the sharp sting of a blade across her palm as she took a blood oath in front of their fireplace. She watched the blood drip onto the carpet. Her father smiled, “ _An oath to family is the noblest thing any of us can do, my precious dawn.”_

Her life as Jester Lavorre, the daughter of Marion Lavorre, the cleric, the heart of the Mighty Nein. She saw them all – all her friends, allies, and enemies – all the victories and the loss. It compounded, folded, twisted, and turned until each memory was hard-pressed into her brain.

She wasn’t crazy. She _lived_ two lives. This was her second life. She understood now.

Jester shoved both her palms outward, “Stay away from him!” She yelled and the _Dunamancy_ spell took hold. A pulse of electric, indigo energy swelled and released in a wave of light. The moorbounder yelped as the pulse hit and pushed them forcefully away from Caleb.

She ran and caught Caleb as he fell forward, his damp forehead pressed into her shoulder, “Run, Jester – run.”

“No.” Jester looped her arms around his waist, her feet planted firmly to keep them both upright, “My story begins and ends with you, Caleb Widogast.”

She closed her eyes, she thought of the Bright Queen, of the throne room, she pictured it as vividly as she could, “Now, hold tight. I’ve never done this spell before.”

~

Queen Leylas rose from her throne as two vagabonds entered with a crackle of magical energy. Her guards came to attention, crossbows drawn, and swords unsheathed – but the Bright Queen raised her hand, “Hold!”

A tiefling woman lifted her head from the injured man’s shoulder, “Bright Queen Leylas. Sorry for dropping in like this.” She smiled.

A familiar smile on the face of a stranger.

She looked around the room, “Oh, hey Essek! You’re here too, huh?”

She grunted, still holding her companion upright, “Right – Hi! It’s me – Jester Lavorre!” She looked down at the man in her arms, her expression softening, “This is Caleb Widogast.”

“Jester Lavorre died twenty years ago.” Essek answered sharply, “Caleb died nearly _five_ years before she did.”

“Crazy, right?” Jester laughed, “But, it’s us! I can do wizard shit like you Essek. Caleb isn’t scrawny.” She met the Queen’s eyes from her spot high above, “It’s really us. Ask me something only Jester would know. Or have a wizard look at our souls or something!”

When no one spoke up, Jester continued, “We lived here in Rosohna. We had a big tree, and everyone _hated_ it. Or at least they did at first because we were like the annoying neighbors. Oh! We also had a hot tub! Essek! You remember, right? I had my weasel named sprinkle. He was super _cute_. We traveled with four others. Beauregard, Caduceus, Yasha and Nott.”

“Impossible.” The Bright Queen muttered to herself. She touched her fingertips to her lips.

“They were not followers of the Luxon.” Essek muttered, rubbing his jaw, “Jester followed the Traveler. Their souls could not be _here_.”

“What if the Luxon _chose_ them?” Leylas asked, “What if it chose them because they were our champions – all those years ago?”

The Bright Queen took a step forward, “We have ways of discovering if your souls are _truly_ the souls of Jester Lavorre and Caleb Widogast.”

“Great! Can you also get a healer for Caleb?”

~

Caleb lifted his aching head and squeezed his eyes shut at the warm brightness of the bedroom.

“Oh, good, you’re awake. I’ll alert Miss Lavorre.” A calm, serene voice said from his bedside. Caleb blinked slowly, letting his mind and body adjust, and letting the fragmented pieces of the past click into place.

“Essek?”

“You remember me.” He smirked lightly, “I’m touched. It is not common for – ah – we’ll call them Awakened Souls to recognize others without guidance.”

He looked down at the bandages wrapped around his muscled torso. His shield arm wrapped and secured in a sling. He could see bruises – purple and blue with yellowed edges – on his ribcage. The memory of the moorbounder about to tear his throat out. Jester holding him.

The face of a queen. Her clothing dappled in starlight.

The memory of that same queen sharing tea with him right before the very end.

He swallowed thickly, “We’re in Rosohna?” It felt too real to be a dream – but Caleb had been misled by dreams before.

“Yes. You teleported into the Throne Room a few days ago. It caused quite the upset.” He chuckled, setting down his book as Jester came surging into the room.

Caleb sat up straighter, his face broke into a smile as bright as the summer sun--

“Caleb!”

Essek casually glided out of the way as Jester barreled into the room proper and grabbed Caleb’s face. She squished his cheeks and crushed her mouth to his. Their teeth awkwardly clacked together but then softened, and the edge of desperation and longing faded with the knowledge that they were both alive and well.

She pulled back, her cheeks dark red, her voice a little breathless, “Did Essek explain anything?”

“I – he mentioned Awakened Souls – “Caleb glanced at him, but Essek pointedly avoiding looking at them. “So, not really.”

“ _You_ said to call you first thing,” Essek said with a wave of his hand.

Jester stuck his tongue out at him.

“It’s alright. I have a theory as to what happened.” Caleb said, rubbing the back of his knuckles against Jester’s cheek in a soft caress.

“What happened to you two is unheard of. The Bright Queen will have more questions.” Essek reminded them as he drifted to the door, he looked back at Caleb and Jester – same souls, same hearts, different bodies, “But, I will buy you some time.”

“Do you think we’re the only ones?” Jester asked, glancing down at the soft, silk sheets, as her hands fell to his shoulders. “Or do you think the others found new bodies, too?”

“We found each other.” Caleb whispered, “Against all factors and probabilities we found each other.”

He gave her a soft, gentle smile, “And that gives me hope.”

Jester hummed softly, her fingertips toying with the dark, curled hair by his neck, “Caleb?”

“Hm?” He raised both eyebrows.

“I’m going to try and find you each time, okay?” Her fangs dug into her lower lip, “If this happens again, I mean, and we grow old and get new bodies…I’m going to keep finding you…”

Caleb smirked, “Do you pinkie promise?”

“I can do better than that, Widogast.”

She canted forward and met his lips in a quiet, unwavering promise.

**Author's Note:**

> yeah so i was driving on friday listening to epsiode 91 and Essek was explaining the Beacon and i was like "Widojest soulmate au say when."
> 
> i hope it wasn't too confusing lmao since i wanted to use their names but yeah, they look different, but they're still caleb/jester !! and they fell in love as Jester/Alexander (kind of). Like, I didn't wanna go too crazy changing their personality or anything, since I know Essek said the soul begins to remember their life around adolescence and I dunno.... Im thinking about this too much., I wrote the first like three pages while drunk. 
> 
> So, essentially, they start remembering as teenagers, but I kept it kinda vague as to how much time passes. ANYWAY IM DONE LMAO


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